BJP sends cyber theft notice to Congress

The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has sent a legal notice to the Congress accusing it of "petty theft" of its online identity. It claims that a portal with the party's acronym and no clear ownership identity was diverting users to the Congress website.

BJP spokesperson Nirmala Sitharaman said here Sunday that the notice was delivered at the Congress office on Sep 27, but there had been no official response from the party.

She said a website, www.bjp.com, had come to the notice of the party which was diverting users to the All India Congress Committee (AICC) website automatically.

"The bjp.org, the official website of BJP has been running since 1995," she said.

The BJP spokesperson said political parties have .org domain and and not .com at the end of their web addresses as they are not commercial institutions.

She said "ownership of bjp.com was masked" and it links the user to the Congress website.

The spokesperson said the party had sought to find ownership details on the relevant search engines. The details were provided as Bharat Journals and Publications and two US telephone numbers were mentioned.

"Technically such an entity should be selling some journals, but the site takes you to the AICC website," Sitharaman said.

She said people all over the world reach BJP through its website and "this is an attempt to divert that traffic towards the Congress party".

"This is deceitful... low-level, pick-pocket type... We apprehend Congress hand," she said, adding that the attempt could also be to say things that are not true of BJP.